Sibelius & Beyond - a major festival of Finnish
music
that took place in London's finest concert
venues
from September - December 2007

This ambitious festival set out to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of Finland's greatest composer, Jean Sibelius, and also to celebrate the tremendous breadth of Finnish composers from before Sibelius to the present day, through performances by Finland's finest musicians.

54 works by Sibelius were performed in honour of his 50th anniversary, across the genres of song, chamber music and orchestral works.

50 individual Finnish musicians and one full symphony orchestra came to London to perform music by 30 Finnish composers. The earliest music in the festival came from Berhard Crusell (1775-1838), and there were world premiere performances of music by Lauri Kilpiö, Tapani Länsiö, Tomi Räisänen and Harri Vuori. There were also first UK performances for works by Aulis Sallinen, Leif Segerstam, Tapio Tuomela and Olli Virtaperko.